


Ring of Familiarity

by Book7BrokeMyBrain



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Pre-Slash, wedding band
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-16
Updated: 2013-12-16
Packaged: 2018-01-04 21:32:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 412
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1085917
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Book7BrokeMyBrain/pseuds/Book7BrokeMyBrain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock makes pragmatic use of the tools at hand.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ring of Familiarity

Sherlock bullied his way into the ambulance with John. The attendants weren't going to argue. Not then. Mycroft followed close behind in a black sedan.  
Sherlock held John's hand in both of his, hunched over the gurney, getting in the tech's way. For once he had no words, scared speechless. He could only rest his fingertips over John's pulse: thready and fast.   
At A&E, both Mycroft and Lestrade had beaten them there, were waiting like a solemn guard, flanking a crowd of personnel in scrubs, ready to descend. They swarmed John, cut Sherlock out of his space, pushed him out like a splinter. All Sherlock was left with was John's blood on his hands, and coat, and trousers (and conscience). He tried to follow, was rebuffed. “Family only.”   
Sherlock scowled. He spun, spotted his brother, stormed over. He grabbed Mycroft's right hand, wrenched and twisted the gold band from his ring finger. He slid it over his own knuckles, turned back to the double doors.   
“I would gladly have given it to you, had you asked,” Mycroft called after him.   
Sherlock brandished the back of his hand and the soft golden shine there as his passport to John. He was stopped anyway.   
John was in surgery, John would be in recovery for hours, John will be asleep, are you sure you're his husband?   
_Ipso facto!_ There is a ring, therefore I am his husband. (I'm in shock. Look, I have a blanket.) It should be enough for these people. In fact, it _was_ enough. Too easy to get through the gates. Frightening.   
They made him sit in the waiting area anyway. With Mycroft. And Lestrade. Lestrade kept staring at Sherlock's left hand and the way he worried the band. A few times, Lestrade reached for his own ring that was no longer there, no longer there to twist so satisfactorily, so smoothly. He kept staring at Sherlock's hands with that wry question on his face: Is there something you'd like to tell me?

*

Much later, John awoke. Sherlock was there, waiting. He took up John's hand, felt his pulse (heavy and strong, quickening).  
John moved his eyes, not his head, to look at the spot of warm metal against his skin. He raised a brow. John's voice was dry and cracked. “You're my husband, now, are you?” Fond rebuke for Sherlock's limitless rule-bending colored his wan face.  
Sherlock dipped his head, clutching at John's hand, speechless again for a different reason. 

**Author's Note:**

> I've been fascinated by Gatiss's choice to wear a wedding band on his right hand when playing Mycroft. That could mean a few things (or nothing), but it spawned an image of Sherlock tearing it off his hand that wouldn't go away until I jotted it it down.


End file.
